1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a monitoring apparatus, a processing method, and a program for implementing the processing method, as well as to a management apparatus, a management method, and a program for implementing the management method. In particular, the present invention relates to a monitoring apparatus which monitors at least one device (in particular, an office printer such as a multi-function copying machine), collects information on the device, and sends the collected information to a management server (host), a processing method executed by the monitoring apparatus, and a program for implementing the control method, as well as to a management apparatus which manages at least one monitoring apparatus and collects information on the monitoring apparatus, a management method executed by the management apparatus, and a program for implementing the management method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there has been a remote monitoring system which is constructed such that a device such as a copying machine and an apparatus (host) having an information processing function are connected to each other via communication medium so that they can communicate with each other, and which remotely monitors the status of the device via the host. In this type of remote monitoring system, the device directly sends an installation completion report indicating that the device has been completely installed, an operation start report indicating that a service person has started operation such as maintenance, an operation completion report indicating that a service person has completed operation, and so forth to the host (Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2000-013518, for example).
The above described conventional remote monitoring system, however, is encountered with problems as below. In sending the above described installation completion report, operation start report, or operation completion report, the device itself should be able to properly communicate with the host. Thus, in the case where settings as to a communicating system of the device are changed, e.g. an IP (Internet Protocol) is changed, the change in settings as to the communicating system for communication with the host is reported after the settings are changed, and hence it is impossible to properly send a report on the change in the settings.
Further, a LAN environment is usually provided as a user environment where image forming apparatuses are installed. In such an environment, connecting a service person's notebook PC to the LAN to communicate with an image forming apparatus is not easy in terms of security because this requires complicated operations such as registration of the notebook PC's MAC address in a communication server.
On the other hand, it may be envisaged that the service person connects a wireless terminal to the LAN in the user environment, but this raises problems such as cost increase and impossibility of communication when reception is poor.